


Khan: A Warrior's Honour - Meta

by Cerridwen



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Inspired by a Movie, Meta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-06
Updated: 2015-11-06
Packaged: 2018-04-30 06:31:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5153786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cerridwen/pseuds/Cerridwen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If we look closely at the motivations and actions of Khan in “Into Darkness” we can see that the writers and Benedict Cumberbatch have crafted the character, not of a homicidal maniac or a blood thirsty terrorist but rather that of a warrior, a man who lives by a warrior’s code of honour.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Khan: A Warrior's Honour - Meta

**Author's Note:**

> Update: I finally got the pictures to work!

If we look closely at the motivations and actions of Khan in “Into Darkness” we can see that the writers and Benedict Cumberbatch have crafted the character, not of a homicidal maniac or a blood thirsty terrorist but rather that of a warrior, a man who lives by a warrior’s code of honour.

The first time we see Khan is when he approaches Thomas Harewood with his bargain.

_Your daughter. I can save her._

What must be noted here is the fact that Khan didn’t kidnap Harewood’s family to use them as hostages or hold out the promise of a cure until after Harewood had completed his end of the bargain, both of which Marcus had done to him. Instead he gave his own blood to heal the child and did so in advance of Harewood’s sacrifice thereby giving up the tactical advantage. After all, once Khan had healed the child Harewood could have told Marcus right from the start without keeping his end of the deal. Since Marcus had the resources and the manpower to keep Khan’s crew from him then he certainly could have protected Harewood’s family from Khan’s retaliation. Given Khan’s reputation as a strategist and tactician he had to know this but he did it anyway. Khan is a warrior by nature and a leader by inclination. Both aspects would demand that he protect an innocent child even if such a move put him at a tactical disadvantage.

That doesn’t mean he’s not going to be as ruthless as circumstances demand in order to protect his crew. Khan is a warrior which is by definition a killer. And he did kill a great many people. But we need to look beyond what the surface appears to be and look deeper at both his intentions and the results of his actions to truly understand this warrior.

In his first attack on the Kelvin archive Khan’s bomb destroys the Section 31 base and kills 42 people. This is an undeniable fact. But why did he want to destroy that particular base? If Khan’s motivation was to declare a “one man war on Starfleet” as Admiral Marcus later claims then it would have made more strategic sense to blow up Starfleet Headquarters. This would have been far more crippling to Starfleet and Marcus then one weapons facility. The answer lies in the torpedoes that we can see in the background behind Harewood.

These are the same torpedoes that Khan designed while under Marcus’ control. But Marcus already had those designs saved on Section 31’s computers. So Khan didn’t blow up the base to destroy the torpedoes. Marcus could make more any time he wanted to. Nor was Marcus at the base when it was destroyed so Khan’s attack wasn’t for revenge on him. This leaves us with the rescue of his crew as Khan’s only reason for the attack. In short, Khan conspired to kill 42 people in order to save the lives of 72 people who were being held hostage under the threat of either slavery or death at the hands of the head of Starfleet. As Mr. Spock would say “The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.” There are some who might claim that Khan shouldn’t have killed at all. But what else could he do? Who could he go to and accuse the head of Starfleet, the second most powerful and respected man in the entire Federation of slavery, torture and probably murder and attempted genocide and be believed?

I also need to point out the probable lack of civilian casualties in that bombing.

That explosion took out an entire downtown city block of a major metropolis during the day.

The death toll should have been well within the hundreds just for the initial explosion alone, never mind those who later died of their injuries. I did a head count as Harewood was walking to his station. I came up with between 25 – 27 Section 31 personnel in the background behind him. That leaves only 15 – 17 unaccounted for. Given the size of the explosion and the number of people we see on the street outside with Harewood before the bombing, the only way those numbers work is if someone evacuated not only the street outside but most of the buildings as well. Only two people knew that the bombing was going to happen, Khan and Harewood. Since Harewood waited until the last moment to send the message to Marcus we can safely assume that he didn’t arrange in advance for the people to be evacuated. That leaves only Khan.

Here we see an integral part of Khan’s code of honour. When he can show mercy to the innocent and helpless he will. And he will do his utmost to limit the casualties, especially among the non-combatants. Yes, Harewood was innocent of any direct crimes against Khan and his people. He didn’t recognise Khan at the hospital so he couldn’t have been directly involved in Khan’s enslavement. But he would have been a military man in Khan’s eyes, not a civilian. To a warrior such as Khan he is not a non-combatant to be shielded but rather an enemy solider and the lives of Khan’s people were on the line.

His warrior’s code shows again in Khan’s attack on the Daystrom. Here Khan’s attack was focused solely on the high command. As has been mentioned in metas by myself and other authors while there were undoubtedly many injured the only confirmed casualties were Admirals. In fact Khan tagged Kirk three times with his weapons targeting system and spared him.

Khan’s targeting here is very specific. He doesn’t simply strafe everything that moves. We can clearly see that Khan’s primary target is Marcus, so much so that Khan doesn’t bother to return fire against the gun crew that Pike calls in to defend them. Rather he merely dodges their fire while remaining focused on Marcus and the other Admirals. He doesn’t even retaliate against Kirk when he opened fire on Khan’s jumpship, he simply ignores him.

If Khan was truly about to start a war against Starfleet without any regard to the loss of innocent lives as Marcus claimed then it would have been far simpler and effective to bomb the entire building, killing everyone inside, not just those within the conference room. In one strike he could have eliminated all of Starfleet’s high command but he didn’t. This was not an attack aimed at the Federation or Starfleet. It was a matter of personal revenge against the man Khan believed had murdered his entire family and committed the genocide of the last of his race.

Here once again is his warrior’s code. He sought retribution when justice was denied him. But again: What else could he do? Who could he turn to for justice? Yes he killed and innocents such as Pike died. Khan is a solider, a warrior not a plaster saint to turn the other cheek in the face of what he believed to be such a great atrocity and crime against his people. So he responded in kind as he himself later states.

But even in his rage he still holds to his code. Unlike Marcus who would later try to have Khan and his entire crew killed, Khan focused his rage only on those he held responsible and stayed his hand against those he did not.

This same code is shown again on Qo’nos when he saves Kirk, Spock and Uhura. His actions are those of a warrior. He fights and kills in order to protect others. He saved 3 lives in order to protect 72 more. As soon as he established that his crew are still alive he immediately surrendered.

I want to draw your attention to the fact that Khan didn’t have to surrender. He had Kirk, Spock and Uhura at his mercy. He could just as easily have taken them hostage and forced Sulu to give up his crew. Since “Captain Sulu” hadn’t fired those torpedoes at him when it was just Khan on Qo’nos then he certainly wasn’t going to do it while three of his crew were in the line of fire. And if Sulu had proven stubborn Khan could have tortured one to death and forced Sulu to watch. But he did none of this. Instead he disarms Spock

and surrenders unconditionally. He even stands there and lets Kirk beat him without raising a hand in self-defence.

Now I’m going to move briefly beyond interpreting his actions and motivations and go deeper into a more speculative look at Khan’s character. As we know from Space Seed Khan is a man who admires intelligence, integrity, loyalty and fierceness of will. These are the reasons he calls Marla McGivers a superior human after all. I believe he saw these same things in James Kirk in this reboot universe.

Kirk showed that intelligence when he bested Khan at the Daystrom. Up until Kirk’s unorthodox method of taking down a jumpship with a fire suppressant system no one there had presented any kind of serious threat to Khan. It was Kirk’s intelligence and ingenuity that allowed him to stop Khan and for a single normal human to be able to do this to an augment would have impressed Khan. He wouldn’t have been _happy_ about it but it definitely would have marked Kirk as being above Khan’s standards for normal humans.

It was after Khan’s surrender though that Kirk showed him his integrity and loyalty. _“On behalf of my friend Christopher Pike I accept your surrender.”_ With this one sentence Kirk showed Khan why he has come all this way, pursued him straight into enemy territory; to seek retribution for the death of his friend. The beating that followed, while unethical and in most circumstances against Kirk’s own moral code, is an action that Khan would have sympathy for. He had felt that same pain and rage 72 times over. Then Uhura cried out “ _Captain!”_ to get him to stop and with that one word Khan realizes it is this man who has chosen to go against the orders that he knows Marcus must have given him. A man who, like Khan has his own code of honour. Khan acknowledges this to Kirk later.

_"Despite your attempt to convince me otherwise, you seem to have a conscious Mr. Kirk."_

Many arguments have been made that Khan was manipulating Kirk. In fact Spock himself states just prior to this scene, _“I believe he will only attempt to manipulate you further”_. And I agree; Khan was fighting for his people’s survival against a military that wanted to destroy them. Manipulating Kirk into seeing the truth was the best way to do that. That doesn’t mean that his manipulation was evil or with bad intentions towards Kirk or his crew. Quite the opposite, without Khan’s manipulation Kirk would have been caught unawares by Marcus when he showed up. The most likely result of this would have the destruction of the Enterprise. Khan’s manipulation saved Kirk and his crew.

To return now to the subject of Khan’s code. As stated earlier Khan is not a man to kill without need or what he holds to be a just cause. To have killed those who were innocent, even by mistake would be a harsh blow to not only his sense of honour but also his integrity and sense of justice. The pain and guilt he felt at Kirk’s accusation that he is a murderer is clearly written on his face.

Khan’s code of honour also prohibits him from striking first. We are told in Space Seed that all the wars he fought were defensive ones. Nowhere is this more clearly demonstrated then when Kirk and Khan take over the Vengeance. It is on their race to the bridge that Kirk orders Scotty to stun Khan as soon as they take over the ship, thinking that Khan was using the two of them and would betray them once the bridge was taken.

_"The minute we get to the bridge, drop him."_

But once on board the Vengeance Kirk and Scotty were of no further use to him. After all why would the man who took down 30 – 40 armed Klingon almost single-handedly need the help of two men to take down around 14 – 16 humans, half of which couldn’t even use their weapons due to the proximity to the warp core. And then there is this.

That’s a phaser rifle in Khan’s hands and I highly doubt that it was locked on stun as the pistol Kirk had given him was.

Here are the facts as I see them. First Khan has superior combat skills and physical strength as evidenced by his taking down about 6 of the Vengeance’s crew in the same amount of time it took Kirk and Scotty to take down 2 combined. Second, he knew the best way to the bridge. Third, he now had advanced fire power. Fourth, he knew that the Vengeance was minimally crewed and fifth, he knew that time was running out. He was with Kirk when Scotty told them that they had only 3 minutes until the Vengeance had full weapons again and would destroy the Enterprise and all on board, Khan’s crew as well as Kirk’s. This was the same crew that he had endured a year of slavery (and possibly torture) at the hands of Admiral Marcus. Yet he still put down the advanced phaser rifle, took back up the locked on stun phaser pistol and went back for them. In short if Khan really was the homicidal maniac he’s been called elsewhere then he would have snapped Kirk and Scotty’s necks just as soon as he was on board because he didn’t need them anymore at that point. It is against Khan’s code of honour to harm an ally who has not betrayed him first.

This is shown again when they get to the bridge. Once all of the bridge crew had been dropped and Kirk, Scotty and Khan have surrounded Marcus there is a moment when they all pause and Khan looks over at Kirk.

In that moment he does the one thing that we earlier saw Spock Prime tell reboot Spock that Khan would never do. He hesitates and looks to Kirk to see what he would do next. In that moment of hesitation Kirk betrayed the man who had saved his life twice. In doing so Kirk violated his own code of honour for as he told Spock:

_"Where I come from, if someone saves your life you don't stab them in the back."_

This did not go over well with Khan as we saw. Yet despite the beating that Khan delivered to Kirk in retribution he neither killed Kirk nor crippled him. Given that augments have 5 times the strength of a normal human plus Khan’s training and experience in unarmed combat it was not by accident that Kirk got off so lightly. He did more damage to Carol Marcus then he did to Kirk and Scotty combined.

Khan’s shattering Carol’s knee when she pleaded with him to stop seems to fly in the face of Khan’s code of honour. Starfleet or not she is clearly unarmed and appears to be far less of a threat to him then Kirk or Scotty. Yet he did to her what he didn’t do to either Kirk who had betrayed him or Scotty who had stunned him. He broke bones.

But unlike Kirk and Scotty Carol was or had been an active Section 31 agent and Khan knew it. In this earlier Meta ([Carol Marcus' role in Section 31](http://khantoelessar.tumblr.com/post/125721176445/carol-marcuss-role-in-section-31)) I made my case for this. But what is relevant here are the facts that when the three men stormed the bridge not only did Khan try to stun Carol but when the shooting stopped Kirk and Scotty are covering Admiral Marcus but Khan is covering Carol. He sees her as an active threat as Kirk and Scotty do not. This makes Khan’s attack on Carol far more understandable. He immobilized an enemy solider, one he obviously saw as being a threat to his goal. But please note, for all the violence that he did to her he still spared her life. If Khan was in a completely unthinking rage, consumed only with a desire for revenge then he could have just as easily dispatched Carol by grabbing her by the hair and smashing her head right into the bulkhead, killing her instantly. But he didn’t. An enemy she may have been but Khan’s code of honour forbade doing more damage than was necessary to someone who had not directly harmed him or his crew as her father had done. So he crippled the adversary that he deemed the greatest threat and moved onto his true enemy, the man who had harmed him and his loved ones the most.

This code of honour continues to show in his dealings with the Enterprise.

I’m speaking of his negotiating with Spock for the release of his crew. Every time I see this movie the same question keeps coming up for me at this point. Why was he bothering to negotiate at all? When he said:

_“I will target your life support systems located behind the aft nacelle and after every single person on board your ship suffocates I will walk over your cold corpses to recover my people.”_

Khan made it clear that he didn’t need to negotiate. All he had to do was destroy the life support (and possibly take out the command bridge as an added precaution), wait for them all to die or evacuate the ship as per General Order 13 and then walk in and take the cryotubes. Negotiating was a pointless waste of time, **_if_** he intended to kill them all anyway. If he had taken the pre-emptive first strike as Kirk had done then he would have won. He and his people would have been free. But Khan never strikes first. It’s against his code of honour.

If one takes the next scene where Khan returns Kirk, Scotty and Carol to the Enterprise at face value it would seem as though he is betraying that code. But this is wrong on two levels. First of all, it was Kirk who struck first and betrayed him and by so doing proved to Khan that he couldn’t be trusted, especially not with the lives of Khan’s crew. Yet as I’ve argued in other metas Khan showed mercy to Kirk and his crew. When he fired on the Enterprise he was aiming to cripple not destroy her. The only areas that he hit were the warp core and engineering sections. If he had targeted the life support as he earlier said he would as well the command bridge it wouldn’t have mattered if Kirk had gone into the warp core or not. Plus as I said before the only damage he did to Kirk when he beat him amounted to little more than a spanking to a warrior such as Khan. That the Enterprise would lose power and fall into Earth’s gravity well is something that not even Khan could have predicted. The two most heavily shielded areas of the ship are Engineering and Med bay. If the scanning capabilities of the Vengeance had been good enough to penetrate that shielding then would it have told Marcus that Khan wasn’t in Engineering when Kirk said he was:

_“He’s in Engineering.”_

Plus it would also have been able to penetrate the shielding around the torpedoes and tell Khan that the cryotubes were in Med Bay.

Both Spock and Khan used the truth to tell lies in that scene. When Khan said “No ship should go down without her Captain” he meant for the Enterprise to go down in defeat but not down in destruction. When Spock said “The torpedoes are yours” he too was saying one thing while implying another.

Lastly we come to Khan’s Kamikaze attack on Starfleet headquarters. The truly horrific number of civilian casualties cannot be either denied or discounted. Hundreds of innocent people died because of Khan. Yet despite the bloodshed I still claim that Khan held to his warrior’s code.

First of all, as we are shown in the first movie, all Starfleet vessels come equipped with a self-destruct mechanism. If Khan had programmed the Vengeance to self-destruct upon impact as George Kirk had done with the Kelvin and the Narada then the resultant explosion would have turned the entire city of San Francisco into a crater and made the land, sea and air around it for miles a radioactive wasteland for centuries.

We also know that the Vengeance had transporters located on the bridge and the bridge suffered no damage when the torpedoes detonated. There is no reason why Khan couldn’t have beamed off the ship before it crashed.

In addition we can see from this picture:

#2 is a Bridge Escape Corridor which probably leads to the evacuation shuttle for the Enterprise’s bridge crew. Given that the Enterprise was used as the model for the Vengeance then there had to be an escape shuttle for the Vengeance’s bridge crew too, probably through the same door that Marcus was trying to open when Khan caught up to him. Both of these facts mean that Khan could have easily escaped the Vengeance to continue his war on Starfleet. Instead he chose to go down with the ship.

Second, Khan’s intended target was a military one, not a civilian one. That he missed and wiped out part of the city I think horrified him.

Again, if he didn’t care about the loss of innocent lives, then he would have armed the warp core and taken out the entire city.

Third, after the crash why would Khan run from Spock when he was surrounded by potential hostages if the lives of those people meant nothing to him?

What could Spock have done if Khan had grabbed one and threatened to kill them if Spock did not drop his weapon? For that matter why did Khan run at all? In the brig he described Spock as being unable to break bones. In this Spock proved him wrong (although it’s worth pointing out that until Uhura showed up with a phaser set on max stun Spock was losing that fight against Khan) but this just goes to show that even Spock can be consumed by a blind homicidal rage, leaving only a desire for revenge on the man who had caused the death of a loved one.

I don’t believe that either of them were thinking clearly but were instead so lost in their pain that there were no thoughts of strategies or tactics, no future plans or cool logic, no codes left at all. There was only pain and sorrow, grief and rage. Even the greatest can fall as all three did; Khan, Kirk and Spock. All three were driven in their pain and grief into doing things that violated their codes of honour. It remains to be seen when Khan returns if they can redeem that honour and repay the debts they owe to each other.

**Author's Note:**

> You can now follow me on tumblr at http://www.khantoelessar.tumblr.com


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